100% correct. Much worse players and against teams with less talent. Everton is not a scrub team but that back four has been shredded in 3 PL matches conceding 10 goals. And Howard May be at fault for one or two (thought he could have done better with Costa’s goal) but he is playing against better quality every day. Same with Guzan who apparently, according to you, is also not as good as Rimando.
Again your comment that Nic should be our #1 is absurd

Rimando saved our bacon and we also had a little luck as they missed some clear chances. I thought Mix, Fabian and Gayu did quite well in the first half. Less impressive were Green, Shey, Corona, Bedoya (to some degree) and Altadore

Unbelievable. Klinsmann won the Gold Cup, escaped the Group of Death, has the best winning percentage of any USMNT’s head coach, ever, and then took what amounted to a C/D squad to Czechoslovakia…and won, in a 4-3-3. With the youngest group of USMNT field players I can remember calling up.

And people are still howling for his head.

Lordy. And people say with a straight face “every USMNT fan would love to replace Klinsmann with Frankie Hejduk.”

Whoa! JK can time travel? And bring a team with him? He should not be fired. He should do a Bill and Ted style scavenger hunt picking up USMNT players in their prime and bring them back to play Belgium at the 2014 World Cup!

sorry…it was sarcasm. people use it alot around here. But I guess as long as we continue to make it out of our group we should keep the same coach (this is more sarcasm). although he is a great coach, many like myself, have a difficult time with some decisions and personnel re-arrangements JK makes. I firmly believe we won the Gold Cup as a result of LD’s effort and Mexico’s failure more so than what Klinsman did. JK is certainly building for the future and has done many noble things that American coaches probably would not do such as pursuing with vigor players with dual citizenship. I am not saying this is wrong but as long as there are fans there will be fans that want to replace the skipper. its just fun

“many like myself, have a difficult time with some decisions and personnel re-arrangements JK makes.”

Which is as it should be. Managers always have their critics.

And how many is many? 20 ,30 40, 50, ? Do you have any numbers on that? Since, “THE EXCLUSION, I’ve probably read a couple of hundred individual posts from people with your level of discontent, give or take.

Which sounds like a lot but compared to how many people probably follow the USMNT. Is nearly irrelevant.

“I firmly believe we won the Gold Cup as a result of LD’s effort and Mexico’s failure more so than what Klinsman did. “

Mr, Head,

Big deal.

It’s the fricking Gold Cup. JK could have handed management of the team to you and the USMNT should still have won the tournament.

If Wondo does well in the Gold Cup the commentary from the cheap seats is “well, it’s only the Gold Cup, minor league, B team stuff”
.
But if LD does well in the Gold Cup now it’s “ what a man,he proved his worth for the WC and won the Gold Cup single handedly” What a load of horsesh*t.

The Gold Cup is a tournament that LD can do well in, wearing Cambodian flip flops, with a bad case of Montezuma’s Revenge and a sprained ankle.

The only reason the Gold Cup mattered at all was because it was the only thing, outside of the Qualifiers approaching any kind of competitive practice for the USMNT prior to Brazil.

This was the price the USSF paid for f++cking up the Olympics and for BB losing the 2011 Gold Cup and thus losing a chance to play in the 2013 Confederations Cup.

I don’t see the point on calling Edu for this game. He’s not magically getting any better and at his best he’s not NT material.
As for Altidore, he’s big and strong with no skills. Unfurtunatelly, he’s also all we have so we need to get used to seeing him lumbering around the field pretending to be a footballer, at least until we find better options.

Well I’m convinced. Jozy has now gone 1.25 USMNT games since his last brace. Let’s go ahead and write him off, and hand the keys to the homeless backpacker we like to think is great because we haven’t seen him in a while.

Let’s calm down. Our forwards only ever go on scoring binges against B-teams and CONCACAF fodder. Against top teams they feed off table scraps. This is how it has ALWAYS been, When was the last time anybody had a big scoring game against proper global opposition? Only guy I can think of is… Jozy vs. B&H.

But there’s some magical combination of undiscovered talent that will suddenly make us the next Germany, if only we hire the right coach, somebody who knows something about how the truly elite teams are built.

Altidore got little to no service all day as many of the youngest were trying to beat Cech from 30 yards out (not going to happen). He even switched with Gyau late to provide defensive help. Who would you put up in the holding forward position? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Exactly.

@Dirk… no I said that
Regarding Shea, there is talent there and he needs maturity and WORK
Regarding Chandler.. there is also talent there, and he also needs maturity and WORK.
Never ‘compared’ the two side by side. Just included both kids as needing to grow and to also get lots of work is all.

Chandler is comparatively much better at his position than Shae. Chandler moved to a new team this year, but he was a starter on his team until they got relegated. Shae doesn’t even dress and got sent back from a team he was loaned. At this point Chandler is a better FB than Shae is a midfielder.

Shea is such a crazy physical specimen, he literally reminds me of a thoroughbred race horse the way he moves. I want him to succeed very much so, but last night’s game showed that he certainly needs some polishing (which I realize is hard to get without getting minutes at the club level).

Loved having Mix and Brooks out there. Loved getting to see Gyau get his feet wet. Loved Chandler’s hard work. Loved getting to see Hyndman get his feet wet.

I hope that JK calls especially Gyau ,Hyndman, Green into all the camps and friendlies to get these future stars up to his expectations. I also really hope that JK keeps Mix in the mix, and hopefully we will improve drastically and soon, over MB in that role!

To get that road result with this group at this beginning stage of the cycle was wonderful.

Jozy got little service but instead played very tough holding the ball up. I appreciated Jozy’s work rate a lot.

Anyone else disappointed in Orozco? Thought he had some bad giveaways and generally looked uncomfortable with the ball.

Thought Brooks was solid, Jozy/Julian were meh.

I really hope we can someday have a strong playmaker. Mix doesn’t seem to be that, Bradley wasn’t that on the biggest stage… I worry about us ever having that presence. Someone with Dempsey’s ball skills who’s a distributor/creator.

To all those talking about Gyau. The kid made a really big statement today! It appeared to me that he decided to do this well before the game. He made one of the best rookie, first-game, statements I have ever seen. In any sport.

Thought Mix and Fabian were great. Mix seemed to be playing deep for a number ten. Almost like he was playing the holding And the playmaking mid role. Mix tracked back a lot and also won his share of loose balls.

The performance from the young guys in this squad was good to see. Gyau, Diskerud, Brooks, & Chandler did good. Jozy, Green, Bedoya, Morales & Hydman did well (up & down performances but nothing too detrimental). Was less impressed with Garza, Ream, Orozco….but didn’t really hurt their standing all that much. Guzan, Rimando, & Fabian were the class of the squad as expected.
Shea should not be called up again until he see consistent minutes for a club somewhere/anywhere.

Looking forward to who gets called up from MLS/MFL for the next set of friendlies. Hoping to see Yedlin, Trapp, Powers, Gil, Rowe, Kitchen, Klute, Arriola, Ferrell, etc…. to see how they compare to the Euro based team on display today.

If they do as well….and we get some players healthy/in form….the 2015 Gold Cup when they have an extended camp together…. the future USMNT could really be fun to watch.

* players likely to be replaced over the course of 2018 qualifying due to age…

This is the deepest and most promising pool of players the US has ever seen at the start of a cycle. Young, Entertaining, but still having that work ethic we’ve come to be know for. And to think that there are still potential “Blue Chippers” who could declare for the US or Come into their own over 3 yrs (Parker Brothers, Kid from Arsenal, Pelosi, Nagbe, etc….) and thing could be very impressive come the Hex.

LOT of good young guys to choose from. We’re going to have quite a deep team.

Don’t think Cameron goes away. He’s still under 30, should be good for another go-around, especially at CB. Also, Dempey is not Donovan…it wouldn’t shock me if he end’s up being America’s version of Miroslav Klose and ends up playing in the next WC, even at 35…Klose did it at 36. Dempsey is not a speed guy; he’s a skill/movement/create-your-own-shot type guy, and that doesn’t drop off after 30 like speed does.

Overall I liked the fundamental approach to the game. More effort to get into the final third and get shots on goal. Gyau is a guy to watch. He really needs first team time this year or next. Gyau has speed, can dribble out of pressure, combines well with other players. Green, I want to see him again after one year with Hamburg. Garza looks like a good athlete with speed and muscle. Made mistakes and covered well. Would like to see him in more games and more settled down and confident. Garza has speed too. I hope JK puts more emphasis on speed with this roster.

I was disappointed with our back line. With the exception of Ream all the rest had 1st team experience and they allowed too many chances. The rest of the team played extremely well considering they mostly have not played together and were going up against a team that had played together.